


Starlight

by TheViolentTomboy



Category: Digimon - All Media Types, Digimon Adventure
Genre: AU, And everyone else - Freeform, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-27
Updated: 2014-01-08
Packaged: 2018-01-02 18:19:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 2,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1060017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheViolentTomboy/pseuds/TheViolentTomboy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The eighth child might've been with them from the start, but she still doesn't have a Digimon partner...</p><p>An AU of Adventure where Hikari wasn't sick enough to miss out on summer camp. Story told in bits and pieces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> An interesting point made on tvtropes "Missed the Call" page: 
> 
> Hikari missed the call at the start of Digimon Adventure due to being sick. Coincidentally, her partner was in the hands of a Big Bad by then, having been lost as an egg and taken in by Myotismon… which raises the question of what would’ve happened had Hikari not missed the call and gone to the Digital World anyway. 
> 
> And thus this fanfic was born.

Taichi isn’t too keen on Hikari coming to camp with him. Neither are their parents, but she insists that her cold is gone and she’s feeling fine. Nevertheless, Taichi swears to both his parents and himself that he’ll constantly watch over her.

When Taichi returns to their shared bedroom after brushing his teeth, he sees that Hikari is out on the balcony.

"Hikari, it’s time for bed. We have to get up early tomorrow to catch the bus," he calls, poking his head out the door. Even during the summer, the night air feels a little chilly against his freshly washed face. "You don’t want to get sick again, do you?"

His little sister doesn’t turn around to face him. Her small hands are gripping the edge of the railing and she’s tiptoeing so that her head is peeking out.

"What’s the matter? Do you see something weird?" he asks, walking over to her side. He takes in the city nightlife, but there is nothing there that is out of the ordinary.

"Hikari?" Taichi says, his voice slightly worried as he gently takes both of her shoulders and turns her so that she’s facing him. Hikari blinks, as if she just noticed him.

"Onii-chan?"

"Let’s go to bed," he continues, taking her by the hand to lead her back inside. Hikari looks behind her as he does, frowning at the distance before holding onto him a little tighter.

The following day, a blizzard hits their campsite and changes their lives, along with six others', forever.

Except that's not _quite_ true.

Hikari knows that that day already happened several years ago. She's just been waiting for a follow-up ever since.


	2. Chapter 2

After Taichi is over his initial freakout of finding himself somewhere that is most certainly not the campsite, having a marshmallow blob declaring that it was waiting for him, and being chased by a ginormous red beetle that is more than willing to try to kill him, he promptly freaks out over the fact that all the above just happened and _he has no idea where his sister is_.

"Don’t worry, Taichi-san," Koushirou says, holding up his hands to try to calm him down. "We couldn’t have been separated very far."

"We’ll find the rest of your friends!" the marshmallow exclaims while hopping up and down like a dribbling basketball.

Sure enough, when they emerge from the tree, they quickly come across the rest of their group, each of them having a small creature hanging around them as well. That is, noticeably, except for Hikari. However, her eyes widen and shine brightly at the sight of his own blob.

"Koromon!" she cries out, rushing over to it before enveloping it into a hug. Taichi’s own eyes widen as well, but for obviously different reasons.

"Hikari, how do you know his na-"

A hellish screech fills the air and they all only have a split second to react before the red beetle comes crashing through the foliage, ready to resume its chase. Taichi immediately grabs his sister’s hand.

"EVERYONE, _RUN_!”


	3. Chapter 3

Everyone’s grateful to be alive now, thanks to Gomamon’s saving them from falling to their deaths via a raft of living fish. Now that it looks like that they lost Kuwagamon for good this time, it is high time for everyone to get to know each other.

"So you’ve never met me or Onii-chan before?" Hikari inquires Koro-, no, _Agu_ mon. The orange lizard shakes his head.

"No, I’ve never seen a human before, but I _know_ I’ve been waiting for Taichi for a long time!" Agumon answers her cheerily. Hikari deflates at his words and doesn’t continue the conversation. Taichi then remembers what she said before.

"Hikari, as soon as you saw him before, you called him ‘Koromon’. How did you know his name?" Taichi asks. Everyone freezes. So does Hikari.

"If you know more about this place than you’re letting on, you really should tell the rest of us," Yamato says, his eyes narrowing as he takes a step towards her. She takes a step back before rushing to Taichi’s side.

"Hey, no need to scare her. She’ll tell us when she’s ready," Taichi says defensively, putting up a protective arm in front of his sister. Yamato makes a sound that is a cross between a snort and a grumble in response, but simply opts for continuing to walk. The air becomes distinctly more tense and uncomfortable until they spot a line of phone booths besides the shoreline of a beach.


	4. Chapter 4

The trolley car's cushions are firm and Taichi's folded blue T-shirt makes an adequate pillow. Hikari is weary from the ordeals of three monster attacks today alone, so she sleeps.

And dreams.

She's flying alone in the night sky and she can just barely make out the shapes of apartment buildings below her. Suddenly a bright spotlight shines down and the scene before her is presented like a stage. A Greymon, identical to the one Agumon evolved into earlier today to protect her brother, is grappling an equally humongous green parrot in the middle of the street.

A much smaller spotlight shines down on two tiny children who are practically right beside the Greymon's feet. She'd recognize her brother's beloved goggles anywhere, as well as the silver whistle that is currently hanging from her neck.

 _That's right_ , Hikari thinks. _This is when-_

One by one, five more spotlights shine. Hikari gasps when she recognizes the other showcased children. Yamato and Takeru, Sora, Koushiro, Mimi, Jou...

 _They were_ all _there. They_ all _saw it._

Morning sunlight streams through the trolley windows and hits her face, stirring her from her sleep. When Hikari opens her eyes, there are sparkles floating in her vision. She blinks once, and then they're gone.


	5. Chapter 5

Hikari’s whole body practically cries out in relief when the water, cool and sweet, goes down her parched throat. She can feel the strength that the desert hike sapped away returning. She’s not really hungry now, though everyone else is eating the mealy grain that their grateful Pyocomon hosts provided.

When she's done gulping down from the bucket, she takes a moment to study them; all the Pyocomon look exactly alike to her, even exactly like Sora’s Piyomon’s previous form. They don’t have individual names either and by the looks of it this is normal in this world.

Her gaze turns to Agumon, who is sitting by her brother’s side and is stuffing his mouth gleefully. She remembers last night’s dream so vividly and now she’s sure that he’s not the same one who she met back then.

Hikari then wonders if she should tell the others about it. It doesn’t seem like any of them remember that incident like she does.

Later, she decides. When they’re away from this village and she can talk to them in private.

She’s snapped out of her thoughts when a high voice calls out her name.

"Hikari-chan, aren’t you hungry? This stuff really doesn’t taste bad at all!" Takeru says, offering her from his own bowl. His bright blue eyes are shining.

Hikari can’t help but to smile back at him and accept.


	6. Chapter 6

Everyone is initially a bit suspicious of the refrigerator apparently just standing there alone in the middle of nowhere, but it's full of fresh eggs and they haven't eaten since they left the Pyokomon village hours and hours ago.

 _And_ it turns out that Yamato can whip up some pretty mean omelets.

After the second day of being attacked at nearly every turn, the mood finally starts to turn light as jokes and small talk is made over the meal, but Taichi sees that Hikari is barely picking at her portion. If he remembers correctly, she didn't eat much at the village either.

"Hikari, is there something the matter? You're not sick again, are you?" he asks worriedly, putting a hand to her forehead.

She shakes her head. She opens her mouth to speak-

"There _is_ something I'm curious about," Koushirou interrupts, holding up his strange silver device, identical to the ones each of the seven other children now possessed. Ever since they got out of the strange factory where Tentomon evolved, he'd been spouting various theories about the nature of the Digital World. "It seems that these somehow allow our Digimon to change form and become stronger, so I wonder why Hikari-san is the only one of us who doesn't have a Digimon partner of her own?"

Hikari's mouth shuts closed as she's suddenly very fascinated by her food. Taichi glares at Koushirou, but he knows the redhead well and how innocently insensitive he can be at times. Koushirou keeps talking, not noticing Hikari's discomfort.

"I can protect both Taichi and Hikari, so there's no need to worry about anything!" Agumon declares, waving his massive claws around and cutting Koushirou off. Taichi mentally thanks him. Hikari manages a tiny smile, but she doesn't look up for the rest of the meal.

Taichi makes a note to talk to her later, but by the time the argument he and Yamato have over whether it's a good idea or not to climb the mountain is done, it's late and time for bed.


	7. Chapter 7

Hikari has another dream that night, and this one isn’t a memory.

She’s in a large room filled with strange machines, and cloaked figures are milling about, turning cranks, pushing buttons, and observing screens.

"Hello?" she calls out, but none of them respond to her as they continue on with their work. She starts to walk around, confused, until a large showcase catches her attention.

There are eggs inside. Large, colorful eggs, just like the one that emerged from her father’s computer all those years ago but all with different patterns. Connected to them via wires are the silvery devices all the children have, and Hikari uses her finger to count all eight of them.

Her eyes widen. Eight devices, eight eggs. One of those eggs must be her missing Digimon. Hikari presses her face and her hands to the glass, frantically trying to figure out which one is hers. She just notices the strange, pretty necklaces that lay in front of the eggs when an explosion goes off behind her, followed by screams of pain as well as cruel, mocking laughter that freezes the blood in her veins.

That’s when she wakes up, gasping.

The sparkles are back, dancing in front of her. Sorry, so sorry, they seem to say before they disappear.

It wasn’t a trick of the light.

"Wait," she whispers, her voice strangely hoarse and strangled as she reaches out with her hands for something no longer there. "Come _back_. I don’t understand.”


	8. Chapter 8

Hikari doesn't know how she's going to bring up her dreams to the others. She can tell them what she's seen, but what good will it do if she doesn't even understand what's going on? Perhaps if the dreams continue, something will make sense.

She holds her device tightly to her heart as she prays that she'll also eventually learn the fate of her Digimon.

All the Digimon partners have evolved at least once by this point except for Takeru's; she has no doubt that Patamon will soon. There have been far too many close calls in these few days, and she's the only one without a personal guardian to protect her. She knows that Taichi will always protect her without fail, but nevertheless she can't help but to feel left out and useless.

Like a _burden_.

And the thought terrifies her.

That said, it looks like they're currently under attack.

Again.


	9. Chapter 9

A mansion with a delicious feast, hot baths, and cozy beds; Taichi should've known that it was all too good to be true.

Which is why he is currently in only his underwear and is being held by the neck, ready to have his life severed out of him courtesy of Leomon's blade. Agumon is too weak and tired to defend him, and all their friends are screaming as they're being sent flying in the night sky via their beds.

Taichi desperately tries to reason with the black-clad Digimon standing behind Leomon to no avail; it seems convinced that he and the other children are the saviors of this world who are destined to destroy him. Taichi really has no idea what it's talking about, but it doesn't seem to matter anymore as Leomon raises his sword to deliver the killing blow.

He screams for his life just as his own bed crashes beside him and his device rolls out to his feet. He can hear his sister howling for him as well, and that when things got weird-

-er.

A brilliant light explodes out from above. Devimon actually shrinks back, as if the light actually burns him. A second later, his devices starts beeping and its screen bursts out light as well, and simultaneously a shadow is forced out of Leomon's body and Agumon evolves into Greymon.

"What-" he gasps as Leomon lets go of him. Greymon and Leomon nod to each other before turning around to face Devimon.

"What happened?" he murmurs, picking up his device. A shrill shriek brings his attention back up, and his eyes widen in horror as he sees his unconscious sister falling off her bed. It's only a stroke of luck that another bed happened to be right underneath hers when she does and it catches her safely.

 _Did Hikari do this?_ he wonders.

"To think that the Chosen Children have this much power already," Devimon hisses angrily. "I must destroy you all immediately!"

**_"Mega Flame!"_ **

**_"Beast King Fist!"_ **

Devimon jumps up to avoid the two orange projectiles. Ogremon leaps out to engage Leomon in hand-to-hand combat, and Greymon wastes no time firing more Mega Flames at Devimon's direction.

"They are the Chosen Children who will save our world, and you will not harm them!" Leomon roars, bringing down his sword hard onto Ogremon's club, actually forcing the green Digimon back.

A bead of sweat rolls down Taichi's cheek; Greymon is miraculously at full power and the light seems to have put Devimon momentarily off-guard, but it's clear now that Greymon is still outmatched as none of his attacks are landing. Devimon realizes it at well, as his smirk is growing with each missed Mega Flame.

Leomon also takes note, as he jumps back to Taichi's side. "This battle is not one that you can win."

And with those cryptic words, he shoots Greymon in the back, and the orange dinosaur immediately reverts back to Agumon. He grabs the semi-conscious Agumon by the stumpy tail and hurls him to Taichi's chest before bringing his sword down to break off the bit of floor the two are on. Taichi and Agumon are sent tumbling down onto a tiny island barely big enough for both of them that is rapidly moving away from the danger.

"Leomon, no!" Taichi cries out, just as Devimon grabs Leomon.

_**"Death Claw!"** _


End file.
